1064 BENGAL PLANTS. [Dioscorea. 
urceolate with narrow mouth and short, spreading lobes. Stamens 
6, adnate to base of perianth, all perfect, or 8 reduced to stami- 
nodes, or only 3 with no staminodes; filaments free or connate in 
a short column below, incurved or recurved above; anthers small, 
2-celled, globose, oblong, or didymous, or the cells discrete on the 
tips of branches of the filament. Pistillode thick, columnar, 3-fid 
or entire or obsolete. ¢ Perianth smaller than in male, 6-fid or 
6-partite, persistent. Staminodes 3 or 6 or 0. Carpels 3, connate 
in an inferior, 3-cornered, 3-locular ovary ; ovules 2, pageant 
pendulous in each cell, anatropous or ja Rpg ee ; styles 3, 
very short; stigmas entire or 2-fid, recurved. J’rwit a berry or 
a 3-valved ge Seeds flat or globose; albumen fleshy, rather 
hard ; embryo minute, enclosed in the albumen. 
958. Dioscorea Linn. 
Herbs with slender, twining, rarely procumbent stems; tuber 
litary, often large, underground or, rarely, epigzal, very rarely 
tubers clustered and long-peduncled at base of stem; leaves alter- 
nate or sometimes opposite, entire or lobed or digitately 3-9- 
RA Flowers always 1-sexual, usually diccious. ¢ Perianth 
ampanulate, rotate, or urceolate ; lobes short, spreading. Stamens 
6, free round a pisti Sis or connate in a central column; or 3, 
alternate with 3 stam es; or 8 without staminodes; anthers 
small; cells ahaa or = see Pistillode thick, fleshy, or 9. 
¢ Perianth segments 6, free, small. Staminodes 6 or 8 or 0. 
Carpels 3, connate in a 3- sa 3-locular, inferior ovary ; ovules 
2 in each cell, sch ps laterally attached near the apex ; styles 
3, ee stigmas terminal, entire or 2-fid, reflexed above the style. 
a 8-cornered, loculicidal capsule, the angles prominent, 
wlth flattened, almost winged. Seeds compressed, some- 
imes with a unilateral samaroid or a circular, membranous 
wing, sometimes wingless; albumen se fleshy or hard, 
2-laminate ; embryo between the lamine with a ea vOPh: 
cotyledon. 
*Stems twining to the left :—[p. 1065] 
compound ; capsules longer than broad; seeds winged at the 
base only :—[p. 1065 
Leaflets digitately 3-5-nerved, always 3 demona. 
Leaflets pinnately veined :— 
